Episode 1: A Man and His Handshake
Episode Description Four dads are flung into a new world, sans sons... Introduction Freddie Wong introduces the podcast off, saying it's NOT a BDSM podcast and that it's a D&D real-play podcast. We are then introduced to the four (five) dads: * Glenn Close (Freddie Wong), a dad-rock, cover band dad/Bard. * Darryl Wilson (Matt Arnold), a stay-at-home sports dad who has now come into his own as a Barbarian. * Henry Oak (Will Campos), the nature-Birkenstock-granola dad/Druid. * Ron Stampler (Beth May), an emotionally restrained step-father and Rogue. * Anthony Burch, the Daddy Master of our wonderful group of dads. Dad Facts Our dad facts for this episode are as follows: * Glenn Close: Played a side stage at the 1997 Bonnaroo Music Festival with the Glenn Close Trio. It was a on the way to the hot dog stand. * Darryl Wilson: He WOULD be the head coach of the West Rock Elementary Doodlers if it weren't for some jerk named Darnell. F*** that guy. * Henry Oak: Brought a large pack of condoms, but only because condoms can be used in an emergency situation to store up to 10 gallons of water a piece, which he believes will be useful this adventure, but Beth May has other beliefs. * Ron Stampler: Ron has never taken a sex-ed class, doesn't know how to be a father, either emotionally or physically, with absolutely no clue. But, he's a step-dad. Plot Summary The Transportation into Faerun (First Part) We enter this episode with Glenn Close and his son Nicholas, who are waiting for the carpool van to arrive. Glenn's lack of perception makes it seem as if everything is fine on this day. However, when Darryl Wilson arrives in his Honda Oddysey Mini-Van, he definitely spots Nick smoking a blunt, with a content, uncaring Glenn kicked back in the grass. After a scolding from Darryl, Glenn takes a hit, and it absolutely the dankest weed he has ever smoked. He then hides the blunt in the mailbox for him and Nick to enjoy when they return. Despite Darryl's claim otherwise, his son Grant makes it visually clear that Darryl is definitely a narc. Afterwards, they move on and find Lark Oak and Sparrow Oak punching a tree, with a non-confrontational Henry Oak suggesting they release their positive spirits to the open air. Henry fails to convince his boys to willingly go to the low-mileage, bad for the environment Mini-Van, but successfully convinces them to race to the van. Henry and Darryl shake hands upon introduction, to the chagrine of Glenn Close, which leads to Darryl claiming "You can tell a lot about a man by his handshake." The introduction is not the smoothest or coolest, with Darryl being at a loss for words when Henry claims to take a "free-range parenting" stance with his kids. The van finally arrives to the Stampler household, where Terry Jr. is waiting alone outside and unsuccessfully tries to leave without him. Ron, who was attempting to make a bowl of instant oatmeal but was thrown off by his wife Samantha's suggestion about the extra flourish of adding water, makes an awkward arrival to the van just in time. After calling Darryl "Dan" after the introduction, Terry Jr. is quite annoyed, displaying a lack of care of what Ron does, immediately before Ron makes a slightly homophobic remark while claiming he doesn't think it's weird. Henry's self-introduction, offer of grape-nuts, and tangent about eating oatmeal 'neat' perplexes Ron, goading him into asking a probably racist question "Is English your native language". With none of Glenn's music available, a failed attempt by Ron to suggest Rufus Wainwright, and Henry suggesting his wife Mercedes Oak-Garcia's "Rock Block of Bach" on KPSC to the annoyance of Darryl, Darryl decides to turn on Led Zeppelin. About two hours later, with an hour to go, the gas tank warning light comes on. Grant focuses on Fortnite while Darryl fails to explain why "Graceland" by Paul Simon is a great song and doesn't fully understand Forenite. Henry requests some band-aids to cover up a boo-boo, which he pairs with his trusty bottle of iodine, which he ends up spilling a bunch in the back seat, infuriating Darryl. Henry notices that the bumpiness and rockiness of the road is definitely not normal for where they are. All of a sudden, a strange purple vortex appears before them and sucks the Van into it, with Grant seemingly not noticing while focusing on getting a Victory Royale. While everything goes purple, the dads all of a sudden feel the crushing weight of the belief that they have not been good dads, making Darryl secretly weep and confirming Ron's belief, who manages to not throw up. Soon, they hear a scream, and they hear a scuffle, and they hear dragging feet, then it all goes dark. Afterwards, the dads begin to wake up, with Glenn and Henry taking damage for not being buckled. With the kids gone, no clue as to their whereabouts, and with absolutely no idea where the van is, Henry attempts to be authoritative to calm the nerves of the dads, but critically fails in doing so, sounding horrified and cowardly in the process, and apologized profusely for the iodine. Darryl grabs his secret item, unwraps it, and chews it quietly without being noticed. As Glenn steps out, he looks upon the beautiful landscape, and decides to look at his phone, immediately putting it in low power mode, making him unable to get any Battle Royale wins. He calls AAA, and they notice the GPS is spinning and malfunctioning, but they are able to admit their last known location, but ultimately mentions the missing kids and thusly fails to convince the AAA technician that this is not a prank, and he tells the dads to call the police. During this, Darryl fails to snag the phone out of Glenn's hand. Glenn then calls 911, tells them where they were, that the kids are missing, and they need help. The cops request he stays on the line, but Glenn hangs up. Meeting the Locals (Second Part) The dads begin to speculate on where they might be, with Darryl thinking they aren't in California, and Henry agreeing, claiming "These are not Redwoods, y'all" in reference to the trees and rocks around them. Glenn and Henry then notice some rustling in the leaves, though a heavily stoned Glenn is unsure. Henry brings this to the attention of the group, when suddenly, and arrow exits the tree line and lands right at Henry's feet. Immediately, three men in red cloaks exit the tree line: * One is holding a net * One is attempting to recast his bow * One has two axes The axe-man charges at Darryl, inciting the first combat, and the first initiation roll. (Meta-comment: this somehow leads Will Campos to question which dad has the biggest ding dong) The bow man then recasts his bow, and leans out and fires at Darryl, who does not take this as a threat. The arrow hits Darryl in his shoulder, dropping Darryl to his knee. The net guy attempts to catch Ron, but misses. The axe guy then runs at Glenn Close, and slaps him in the face with the side of the axe, sobering Glenn up immediately. In the first act of combat, Ron attempts to call his stepson Terry Jr., and ask him what to do in the middle of battle. An annoyed Terry Jr. says he should probably die, as that sounds like something he should do. Ron then tearfully hangs up, having suffered some psychic damage from the coldness. Henry then decides to throw iodine on the arrow wound in Darryl's shoulder, splashing some in the general area of the iodine, but deciding not to yank out the arrow. He also hits Darryl's face, making it sticky. Darryl then goes into a rage, fueled by his son, and everyone else, not listening to him, and grabs his hatchet from the van and charges a red-cloaked man, hitting him in the neck, spurting a bunch of blood onto Darryl, who whispers "Where's my son?". Glenn, having just been hit, decides to get into the van, turning it on and turning it while revving up to hit another red-cloaked guy. He successfully hits him, dragging him along on the hood, and spraying wiper fluid onto they guy. They guy with a hatchet in his neck fails to hit Darryl, and double axe guy manages to carve a chunk out of Henry's flank. Darryl, having heard "The Beast" rev its engine, decides to throw the guy with a hatched in his neck into the path of the van. When Glenn hits him, both men are now fleshy bags of broken excuses for bones, earning a thumbs up from Darryl, before he throws the horns out the window. Glenn then decides to brake, sloughing both bodies onto the ground, leading him to vomit and Darryl to almost vomit. Henry, having been amazed at Darryl's actions, feels an ancient elemental power within him, as his eyes go green, and a poison spray of iodine blasts forth from his hand, hitting the only red cloak left in the mouth, who then decides to try to run. Immediately, Ron removes the arrow from Darryl's shoulder, tearing some ligaments, and causing him to vomit. The remaining red cloaked man exclaims "God dammit, I said-I knew we shouldn't have come back for the adults, I knew it!" before running away. Darryl says to do something. Then, suddenly, a horrified Henry thinks of his two beautiful boys being lost in this strange world, leading to another veritable nature orgasm shoots through his body, and he slams his hands on the ground, causing vines to sprout from the ground and entangling the man. In a congratulatory, but silent act, Darryl pulls out his home-brewed beer, a "Pale" ale, a joke he laughs at himself, and hands it to everyone, healing all but Ron, who does not drink it because he once knew someone who drank too much beer and who gives his beer to Glenn. Darryl then walks up to the entangled man and offers a beer, unaware the guy cannot reach the beer through the vines. Darryl then goes to cut the vines, but not before Henry is able to convince him to tie him up first to not let him get away. Darryl then goes and grabs a few more of his secret item, which Henry manages to see. The dads then interrogate the man about the whereabouts of their children, learning of the Lance and how their children got auctioned off a week ago, to which Ron inquires "How much?". Darryl attempts to shake his hand, but fails to realize again that the man is tied up and unable to shake the hand. The man identifies himself as Three, being the third favorite of the Lance, before Glenn comes up and drunkenly threatens him with his Kershaw Every Day brand pocketknife. He offers to take them to the Lance to find out where their kids might be in exchange for not killing him, causing the first "Dad Huddle" to decide on what to do. They decide to parlay him for their children, with Henry calling "my children" first. They then group hug, further frightening the tied up man. Darryl steps away and pulls out his Nokia 3310 Original, commenting how he gave his nice phone to Grant for Fortnite graphics, in order to call his wife Carol. He then hums his fun little song to call Carol: "310..523...10254...I love Carol", leading to a confusion as to the amount of numbers in her phone number. On the call, Darryl admits he lost the kids and dented the hood of the car, leading to a furious exclamation from Carol about the car, and her admittance that she knew he would do something like this one day. As Darryl tries to stutter out the incident, while slightly blaming the video game, she interrupts him and asides over to Darnell, saying that they need to go. Darryl wonders why Darnell is there, but asks Carol to tell him to reply to him about the set of plays he emailed to Darnell. Henry offers emotional support while Ron jokes about "Who is Darnell?", leading Darryl to double fist two beers. We're Off to see The Lance (Third Part) Darryl then tells Glenn to get Three into the van, who does so with the knife to Three's throat as an intimidation method, calling him Ke-mo sah-bee, which Henry explains to Ron may be a Japanese term, or a quote from The Lone Ranger with Tanto, while Darryl continuously honks the horn for everyone to get in. And the dads + Three short rest as they head off to Phandalin. Glenn asks Henry what was up with the vines, to which Henry has no answer. He suddenly feels a mysterious, magical presence inside himself, and attempts to change the conversation by asking his dads to respect his privacy in figuring out his changing body. Henry puts 10 condoms on his fingers to hopefully stop such an action in the future, apologizing more for the iodine, to which Darryl responds: "Iodine? I don't mind." Giving Henry a good laugh which he says he needed, this dad joke suddenly rings into the ears of the other dads, where they take psychic damage from the pure corniness of the joke. Noticing Three did not get it, Darryl decides to explain the joke to Three, which arguable is worse than a dad joke alone, and damages the psyches of the others even further. Glenn, holding Three at knife point still, asks him if he's seen vines like that before, to which Three mentions there are rumors of people with magical abilities, but Henry does not want to talk about it. Darryl and Ron bond over a disparaging remark about liberals. Phandalin (Fourth Part) As they approach Phandalin, they debate whether to hide the van or not. Darryl attempts to use the 'Gentlemen's Agreement' to make sure Three will not betray them. Ultimately, they decide to hide the van, untie him, and hold a hidden knife to his back while he leads them to the Lance. Upon arrival at the Lance's house, they try to peer into it and sneak a bit. As Darryl disagrees with this and goes to knock, Henry loses his cool, yelling at Darryl about his alpha-male bullshit, seemingly not making anyone aware of their presence. Darryl silently turns and knocks anyways, and Ron opens the door himself, much to the disappointment of Darryl. It is this moment that an older man walks out of a door inside, aiming a large crossbow towards the dads and asking what their business is. Ron claims Gran Torino was not racist as he comments on how the Lance looks like Clint Eastwood. Three then informs the Lance that the dads killed Two and Four, and the Lance kills Three in disappointment with his failure. The crossbow auto reloads, and the Lance threatens the dads if they try any troublesome matters. The Lance requests that one of three choices be made: the rest of his family will come and kill them, an agreement will be made that benefits the Lance more, or they will leave, and after one hour he will call the city watch to kill them. The dads huddle up, trying to concoct a lie to tell the Lance to intimidate him into giving them the location of their children. As they leave the huddle, Glenn, with his guitar of indeterminate brand, begins to cover Wonderwall and explain how they are travelling emissaries, to which Darryl tries to stop him, which then causes Henry to stop Darryl from talking with kiss. This happens to make Darryl very unsure of himself, as he feels love for the first time in a long time. Ron then begins to sing "Maybe, just maybe, he's gonna be the one that saves...us." All of this jumbled mess does not phase the Lance, and he stops them, asking for what they have to offer him. They show him Snake, which Henry tries to pawn off as a game of kings and scholars. An unfortunate natural 1 then makes the Lance realize its a baby game for babies. Ron makes an impassioned plea, describing his dog Dottie the Dachsund, which the Lance sympathizes with, looking forlorn at a picture of him with a large dog, named One. Darryl pulls out his wallet and shows the Lance a photo of himself, Grant, and Lincoln, their dog, to which Lincoln asks where Lincoln is. After stating that Grant lost him, the Lance berates Darryl on his sack of shit son, to which Darryl rages, and Henry kisses him again, calming him and letting him ask for Grant back in a chance to punish him. The Lance offers them the information so that Grant can be punished. He then slips Darryl into a blood pact by cutting his hand onto a piece of paper, that then collects into a picture of Grant's face in a constant agony-ridden scream. After explaining the blood pact, he shows them the ledger, as Henry and Glenn attempt to take a photo of the ledger within the two seconds that all of the names of the kids and their locations would be visible. They give him the Nokia, and as the Lance looks at the Nokia to play Snake, Darryl kisses him and Henry rips the page out of the ledger. With the paper, the dads learn: # Lark and Sparrow are in Neverwinter # Nick is in Waterdeep # Terry Jr. is in Rockport (retconned to Roqueport) # Grant is in Meadowshade They explain that the kiss is a manner of greeting and appreciation where they are from. As they exit, Darryl thanks them for being a team in the situation. Henry apologizes for introducing the kissing as an aspect of their life, they then decide to gather more intel before they leave, so as to make a 'Rock solid decision', thus harming the dads before the episode ends. Quotes * "Three never told us you look so much like Clint Eastwood. Gran Torino is excellent and not racist at all." - Ron Stampler * "I burnt down my first school!" - Lark Oak (possibly Sparrow, it is unspecified) Trivia * Despite giving the phone to the Lance, the dads somehow retain the Nokia 3310 afterwards. This canon is never explained. * Rockport is retconned later to 'Roqueport' so as to not infringe on The Adventure Zone's Intellectual Property and World State. * This is Beth May's first game of Dungeons and Dragons ever. Music/Sound Effects * Theme song is "Alright" by Maxton Waller * Editing done by Freddie Wong External Links Category:Episodes